Government U-turn has long been on the cards

LAST November stories started circulating in the media that the government was thinking of putting "on the back-burner" Tony Blair's much-touted scheme for making everyone in Britain carry a compulsory, biometric identity card. The rumoured explanation was that Gordon Brown wanted shot of his predecessor's big idea, because the cost of ID cards was mushrooming, the technology was still inadequate and there were fears the whole notion might be challenged in the courts.

However, no sooner had these press reports appeared, than the government denied them categorically. Peter Hain went on the BBC to say it was "not true" that the scheme was being downgraded, while a senior Home Office minister, Tony McNulty, said: "As...